Hello,
The OONI team warmly welcomes you to join us next week for our monthly
community meeting.
Where: https://slack.openobservatory.org/ (OONI Slack channel)
When: Monday, 25th June 2018 at 14:00 UTC (for 1 hour)
We'd love to hear your thoughts and suggestions on how we can improve
our tools and research methodologies.
Please add topics that you would like to discuss as part of the meeting
in this pad: https://pad.riseup.net/p/ooni-community-meeting
If you're not able to join us, please feel encouraged to join us on
Slack or IRC any other day!
Looking forward to connecting with you soon!
All the best,
~ The OONI team.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello,
Today OONI and Nigeria's Paradigm Initiative published a joint research
report: "Tightening the Noose on Freedom of Expression: 2018 Status of
Internet Freedom in Nigeria".
* Full report: https://ooni.torproject.org/documents/nigeria-report.pdf
* Summary: https://ooni.torproject.org/documents/nigeria-report-summary.pdf
* OONI censorship findings:
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/nigeria-internet-censorship/
This report examines surveillance and internet censorship in Nigeria,
the latter based on OONI Probe network measurements:
https://api.ooni.io/files/by_country/NG
Most of the sites found to be blocked are associated with content on the
secession agitations for Biafra in Eastern Nigeria.
These sites were blocked by (at least) 3 Nigerian ISPs: MTN, Globacom,
and Airtel. MTN appears to be blocking sites by means of DNS tampering,
while Globacom blocks sites by means of TCP/IP blocking, and Airtel by
means of HTTP blocking.
News outlet naij.com was temporarily blocked in November 2017, but has
since become accessible.
Most sites and services appear to have been accessible in Nigeria
throughout the testing period, including popular communications
platforms like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, and circumvention tools
like Tor.
Thanks for reading!
All the best,
Maria.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello Oonitarians,
Today we publish a community interview featuring... Julie Owono! :)
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/ooni-community-interviews-julie-owono/
Julie Owono is the Executive Director of Internet Sans Frontieres, known
for leading campaigns against internet shutdowns in Cameroon, Togo and Chad.
Over the last years, Julie has spearheaded advocacy efforts and
championed community engagement in West Africa.
Meet Julie & learn more about her work:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t842clfakt0
We'll be publishing more interviews with community members over the next
months. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to stay tuned!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQhDgj9wBf4_w5bWFvLlq-w?sub_confirmation=1
Cheers,
Maria.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello!
Next week the OONI team will be attending RightsCon
(https://www.rightscon.org/) in Toronto, between 16th-18th May.
We'll be participating in 4 sessions (as speakers and moderators), which
you can find in our blog post:
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/ooni-rightscon-2018/
If you're going to RightsCon and interested in meeting up, please get in
touch! :)
Cheers,
Maria.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello Oonitarians!
Today we published our first Community Interview featuring.... Moses
Karanja!
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/ooni-community-interviews-moses-karanja/
Over the last years, Moses has championed OONI community engagement
across Africa, and we have worked with him on a number of research reports.
We are grateful for all his work, and wanted to provide you a chance to
learn more about his work.
You can view his interview here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pam2UQoZ1qM
This is the first interview of a series of community interviews that
we'll be publishing over the next months.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel to stay tuned!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQhDgj9wBf4_w5bWFvLlq-w?sub_confirmation=1
Cheers,
Maria.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello,
The OONI team is excited to let you know that we just published our
first short film!
Our 5-minute documentary is called "ParkNet: Exploring Internet
Censorship in Cuba".
* About the film:
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/parknet-short-documentary-cuba/
* Watch the film on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QslsL84jx4E
Last year we traveled to Cuba to explore its internet landscape. You
might remember that we published a research report on our findings:
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/cuba-internet-censorship-2017/
Today we publish this short film to share some of our key findings and
to provide a feel of Cuba's unique internet landscape. We also wanted to
experiment with the idea of presenting censorship findings with video.
Our OONI YouTube channel will feature new and exciting content over the
next months. Subscribe to receive updates:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQhDgj9wBf4_w5bWFvLlq-w?sub_confirmation=1
Thanks for watching!
Cheers,
OONI team.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello,
I'm sending this email as a reminder that OONI's April community
meeting will take place tomorrow.
Where: https://slack.openobservatory.org (OONI Slack channel) or #ooni
on IRC
When: Tuesday, 24th April 2018 at 14:00 UTC (for 1 hour)
Please add topics that you would like to discuss as part of the meeting
here: https://pad.riseup.net/p/ooni-community-meeting
Looking forward to connecting with you tomorrow!
Cheers,
Maria.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello,
The OONI team warmly welcomes you to join us next week for our monthly
community meeting.
Where: https://slack.openobservatory.org/ (OONI Slack channel)
When: Tuesday, 24th April 2018 at 14:00 UTC (for 1 hour)
We'd love to hear your thoughts and suggestions on how we can improve
our tools and research methodologies.
Please add topics that you would like to discuss as part of the meeting
in this pad: https://pad.riseup.net/p/ooni-community-meeting
If you're not able to join us, please feel encouraged to join us on
Slack or IRC any other day!
Looking forward to connecting with you soon!
All the best,
~ The OONI team.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello Oonitarians,
Over the last months, the OONI team has had the opportunity to
participate at a number of conferences and events in Africa, India and
Europe.
You can learn more (and find the slides and notes) via our latest blog
post:
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/ooni-in-africa-india-europe-conferences/
Cheers,
Maria.
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E
Hello,
Today OONI and Sierra Leone's Campaign for Human Rights Development
International (CHRDI) published a joint research report examining the
network disruptions that occurred last weekend amid Sierra Leone's 2018
runoff elections.
Our report is available here:
https://ooni.torproject.org/post/sierra-leone-network-disruptions-2018-elec…https://twitter.com/OpenObservatory/status/981899863012139008
Throughout the election period, we have been coordinating on the
collection and analysis of OONI Probe network measurements. OONI data
did not show any signs of internet censorship, but the testing of
WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger indicated some form of performance
degradation on the network.
Last weekend, locals reported that an internet blackout occurred
following the runoff elections, so we referred to third party data
sources to investigate further.
Google traffic and BGP announcement data aggregated and published by
RIPE show that two network disruptions occurred in Sierra Leone last
weekend:
1. In the early hours of 30th March 2018 (before the runoff elections)
2. Late at night on 31st March 2018 and in the early hours of 1st April
2018 (after the runoff elections)
We reached out to Sierra Leone Cable Company (SALCAB), Africell, Orange,
and ACE to better understand how and why the two network disruptions
occurred.
So far, we have only received a reply from the Vice Chair of ACE, who
claims that the network disruption was caused by an ACE submarine cable
cut and that they did not receive any government orders to switch off
the internet.
SALCAB has also released a public statement, denying reports regarding
government orders to shut down the internet, and arguing that the
network disruptions were caused by issues pertaining to the cable cut.
It's worth highlighting though that the two network disruptions appear
to be different.
In the first case, Google traffic and BGP data only show a partial
disruption (with only a few ASNs and subnets affected), and neighboring
Guinea and Liberia appear to have been affected as well. This could be
explained by the ACE cable cut.
In the second case however, Google traffic shows a complete drop in
traffic from Sierra Leone to Google Search, while BGP data shows that
most prefixes were withdrawn. No neighboring countries appear to be
affected by the second disruption, even though it was more severe than
the first. This suggests that an internet blackout likely occurred.
We will update our report when/if we receive further information from
the providers we reached out to.
Thanks for reading, and please feel encouraged to share any information
you may have on this case.
Thank you.
~ OONI team.
**
--
Maria Xynou
Research and Partnerships Coordinator
Open Observatory of Network Interference (OONI)
https://ooni.torproject.org/
PGP Key Fingerprint: 2DC8 AFB6 CA11 B552 1081 FBDE 2131 B3BE 70CA 417E